Chamelion Circuit
by celticfox
Summary: “I knew there was something wrong with the chamelion circuit.” 1960's Foreman's Junkyard wasn't the first time the Doctor landed on Earth. Set, in the confusing manner of time travel, both during TPotW and long before An Unearthly Child. Please R&R!
1. Crash Landing

**The BBC own practically everything in this story. Much thanks to Marnal Gate and her insanely detailed Gallifreyan website I stumbled across and used as reference. Her website is called RASSILON, OMEGA And That OTHER Guy and definitely worth a read! **

* * *

_  
In the Vortex/ Earth, March 3, 2006, 9:30_

"For Rassilon's sake, Theta, don't you even know how to fly this thing?" the young Gallifreyan known as Ruath cried, holding on to a lever whilst the TARDIS they were in bucked and jolted.

"Of course I do!" the one called Theta called back, twisting knobs and pressing buttons in wild abandon. "This just makes it more fun!"

"I can't believe you two roped me into this," moaned Drax from his crouch behind the console. "Why not take Koschei? He actually _likes _this sort of thing!"

"Aw, but we wanted _you, _Drax!" Theta said, laughing.

"I'm going to kill you when we get home," Drax muttered.

With a flurry of sparks and groans the time ship settled down on solid ground. "Well, we're out of the Vortex at any rate," Ruath sighed in relief. "Now to see where we've landed."

Theta examined the console, then punched the air in joy. _"Yeess!" _he shrieked. "Sol III, London, March 3, 2006 A.D.! We're _here!"_

"Yes, yes, yes, we all know your obsession with this bloody primitive planet," Drax grumbled. "I just hope it's as great as you say it is."

"This is going to be so fantastic!" Theta said to himself. "Wow!"

* * *

_Earth, March 3, 2006, 9:15_

Rose Tyler sat against the console of the TARDIS and blinked back tears. She was holding a small dog-eared photograph of three people, taken in a photo booth on the planet Sirius IV. They were all smiling big cheesy grins, and her photo self was laughing at some joke Jack had made. The Doctor was grinning his usual manic grin with one arm slung on Rose's shoulder. For some reason the photo machine had printed 'Our Honeymoon' on the top. They'd had a good laugh about that.

If anyone had told her then that in a few months she'd be the only one left alive she'd have thought they were crazy.

But here she was, stuck on Earth, unable to help her friends trapped and dying in the far future. She sighed. It had been a week and she still didn't know what to feel. Some days she thought it all hadn't even happened yet, and somewhere the Doctor was still alive and traveling the universe. Some days she thought they were dying right now and she felt so frustrated that she couldn't help them. Some days she knew they- he was dead and all she could do was mourn the most amazing being she'd ever known.

And some days she realized she was the only one now who knew the Time Lords had ever existed.

That was one reason why she couldn't just let the TARDIS die like the Doctor had told her to. It was, after all, the last Time Lord object in the universe, the last proof they had been there. The real reason, though, was that she wasn't ready to let him go. Not yet. Probably not ever. And she knew she'd never ever ever forget the one wonderful year she'd had him.

The sadness in his eyes as he told her of the war that had destroyed his planet. The pure joy as he cured the nanogene-infected humans. His simple, childlike pleasure at dancing with her. The wonder as he saw new weirdnesses. The hardness as he confronted the latest villains. The amazement she'd felt when he hesitated between saving the world and saving her. The fear that had flowed through her at the madness in his eyes when he looked at that Dalek. The sadness as she realized how little he valued his own life. The terror she'd known when he stepped between her and the Reapers. No, she wasn't ready to give that up just yet.

But he was dead now. Dead and gone, the last Time Lord in the universe, and now they were extinct with nothing to remember them by but a dusty blue box.

She pressed 'replay' on the console.

_"This is Emergency Programme One. Rose, now listen; this is important. If this message is activated, then it can only mean one thing. We must be in da-"_

She pressed, 'stop'.

"I think I'm going for a walk," she announced to herself.

* * *

_Earth, March 3, 2006, 9:29_

It was the sound. The sound of the universe arriving on your doorstep and yanking you out of your ordinary little life. The grinding, beeping, singing song of the TARDIS.

She forgot she'd just left the machine, forgot there was no way for him to escape, forgot everything and ran. The familiar blue box had materialized on a street corner just half a block away, and she was there in seconds. She stared at it for half a minute, then, daringly, reached out to touch it. It felt solid, warm to the touch. Not a hallucination, then. She tried to get the courage enough to knock, but just as she raised her arm the door opened.

A young man with tousled black hair stuck his head out. He stared at her. "Oh," he said.

She stared back. "Who the hell are you, and what are you doing in the TARDIS?"

"T-t-tardis?" the young man stuttered. "What Tardis? What's a Tardis? I was just hanging out in this here, this, this," he looked back at the blue box, "this- what are these called again?"

"Police boxes?" Rose suggested.

"Ah! Yes! Police box. No, no Tardises here! I'm just an ordinary human being, doing, doing- what is it you do in a police box?"

"Make phone calls?"

"Yes! Exactly!" he said in relief.

"Nice try, but police boxes haven't been made in fifty years," she said, trying to be angry but failing. You couldn't be angry with this guy. You could just be severely annoyed.

"Oh. Really?" he said, looking crushed. "I _knew _there was something wrong with the chamelion circuit."

"Look, who are you, anyway?" Rose asked, taking him in in more detail. He was wearing rather unusual robes- a white-and-gold cross between Superman and Merlin with huge cuffs and collars. A gold ornament hung on a wire around his neck. His long black hair was wild and scruffy, tied back in a messy ponytail down his back. He had a rather insane look to his face, a very long nose, and big ears.

"My friends call me Theta Sigma," he introduced himself, "but I prefer to be known as the-"

He was cut off mid sentence by the door swinging open. A beautiful haughty blond girl with an aristocratic air and sharp blue eyes stepped out. "Thete, what _do _you think you are doing?" she sniffed. "Fraternizing with the natives is against the first Law of the Time Lords!"

_Oh my god they're Time Lords, _Rose thought, gasping. Of course, even if they were destroyed in the Doctor's past, their past time voyages were still taking place. _Ugg, this makes my brain hurt. _

"Draaax!" the girl called imperiously back into the TARDIS. "Drax, we're here!"

A third being stepped out into the sun. He appeared to be about the same age as the other two, with wild brown hair as long as Theta's. He rubbed his eyes sleepily. "Okay, okay!"

"How old are you guys anyway?" Rose asked.

"Eighty-five this Otherstide," Theta began. The girl slapped him.

"Oww! That _hurt, _Ruath!"

"You deserved it to be such a scatterbrain," Ruath replied scornfully. "You total _idiot, _you yourself told me these natives have a mere centennial lifespan!"

"Oh, right," he mumbled.

"So what would you be in human years?" Rose said.

His face took on the inward look of someone doing an extremely fast mental calculation. "Twenty-one," he said after a few moments.

"Theta-" Ruath began.

"It's okay, I know you're Time Lords," Rose sighed.

All three of them stared at her. Theta said, "Rassilon, you're not one of our agents are you? Please don't be," he said. Unexpectedly he grabbed her hand and felt her wrist. Then he let it fall. "Nope. One heart," he said in relief. "Gosh, for a moment there I thought we'd been rumbled!"

"_You're _using that TARDIS illegally, _aren't _you," Rose teased.

"How, by the Great Seal of Rassilon, do you know about TARDISes if you're not a Time Lord?" Drax asked.

"Well, you see, I happen to... well... it'd be rather hard to explain," she said sheepishly. "Anyway, welcome to the planet."

Theta gazed around him. "It's just like I thought it would be," he said in hushed, reverent tones.

"Looks just like every other backwater dump," Drax grumbled sourly.

"Oh, shut up! It's _perfect!" _He turned to Rose, his eyes shining. "It's all just so _fantastic!"_

Rose started at the word. She realized with a pang of guilt that these alien teenagers had made her completely forget the Doctor for the first time in a week. Oh, god.

She noticed Ruath looking at her sharply. She swallowed.

"Hey, are you a time traveler or something?" Drax asked. " 'Cause you seem to have way too many tachyons."

"Yeah," she said, grateful for an explanation, "yeah that's it."

"Hey, we could give you a lift, if you're stuck here," Theta offered.

"No we could not!" Ruath said sharply. "Non-interference, remember?"

"Actually," she said, her heart in her mouth, "I have a time ship, I just need it repaired."

"I'd be glad to help you out," Theta said. "What's your name again?"

"Rose. Rose Tyler."

"Then, Rose Tyler, show me your ship."

**Please review!**


	2. Theta Sigma

**Hey, y'all, it's me again, with the second chapter! If any of you are wondering, Koschei and Ushas are probably not going to feature largely in this fic, because hard as it is to do a young!Doctor, it would be a lot harder to do a young!Master and a young!Rani and I'd probably get them all wrong.**

_Earth, March 3, 2006, 9:32_

"Wait, wait, wait.. you are not going to go waltzing off with some unknown time traveler and leave us on this desolate rock!" Ruath exclaimed. "I mean, you've made some monumentally stupid decisions in the past-"

"-crashing your skimmer into the Panopticon, introducing cats into the Gallifreyan ecosystem, skipping Transdimensional Locus Attraction Dynamics and attending Theory and Practice of Yo-Yos and Juggling for Beginners instead, failing Practical Theology, Temporal Theory, and Discontinuity Physics, being best friends with Koschei, hijacking TARDISes, becoming obsessed with this stupid planet-"

"-thank you, Drax. As I was saying, this is a pretty stupid decision even by _your _standards, and that's saying something."

"-oh, and electrifying Borusa's perigosto stick-"

"I did that with Ruath!"

"Oh please, don't bring _me _into this-"

Rose watched their argument practically in tears. These three young people full of life and joy would be destroyed, their planet turned to lifeless rocks and dust. And she was the only one who knew.

"Rose, are you okay?" It was Theta. His bright eyes were wide with concern.

She sniffed. "Yeah. I mean, it's all right if you don't want to fix my ship, it's okay..."

"I am going to fix your ship, Rose Tyler," Theta declared. His long hair chose this moment to flop into his eyes, rather ruining the gravitas of the statement. "Ruath and Drax can go and... shop, or something. Something 'domestic'."

Rose gave a little sob.

"What's wrong?" he asked her in genuine distress.

"You just... remind me of someone, that's all," she said, swallowing. "Someone I used to travel with. But now I'm stuck here..."

"Well don't worry," he said, "I'm going to fix your ship and then you'll go and find him, okay?" He peered anxiously at her from under his mop of hair.

"Yeah," she said.

"Why him?" Drax asked. "He's the one who failed Temporal Theory! He's the one who crash-landed here!"

"Oi, I meant to land here!" he replied. "Come on Rose, let's leave those barbarians behind."

"Okay," she said, and started walking back to her TARDIS. Theta waved good-bye to his friends, calling, "See you later!" over his shoulder. She felt glad it was him she was taking to the TARDIS. Of the three young Gallifreyans (was that the name of his planet? Gallifrey? Such a beautiful, musical name) she knew she liked him most, probably because he did remind her of the Doctor, with his obvious love of Earth and scorn of authority.

"Can I ask you something?" he asked her as they walked down the block. He was peering in shop windows and at people on the street like they were the most amazing things in the universe.

"Sure."

"Can you get boysenberry ripple ice cream on this planet?"

She stared at him in surprise. "Uh, yeah, I guess."

He punched the air. "Excellent! By Rassilon, I _love _this planet!"

"Me too," she said softly. Definitely like the Doctor.

* * *

When they came to the TARDIS Theta stared at the exterior. "I thought you said they didn't have police boxes anymore."

Rose swallowed nervously. The cat would be out of the bag soon enough. "Uh, yeah, I did..."

To her intense relief he did not enquire further, but waited patiently as she unlocked the time ship. As they stepped inside the TARDIS hummed in pleasure. "She likes you," Rose told her new friend, her throat constricting.

He glanced about. "I like the decorating!" he told her, grinning. The grin was eerily familiar, and she didn't smile back. He turned to the console. The grin faded, became a frown, became a still lack of expression.

"This is a TARDIS," he said neutrally. "It's been redecorated, but it's still a TARDIS. Type 40, if I'm not mistaken."

Rose looked at her shoes.

"Did you steal it?"

"No," she said forcefully.

"Then how did you come to be in possession of it? That is a clear violation of Time Lord Rule IB3."

"Well he was never one for rules, my traveling companion," she said, feeling as though she would break into tears any minute now. "You might call him a renegade from Time Lord society."

He went still. "A renegade," he said quietly.

"Please don't take the TARDIS away from me," she begged. "It's all I've got to remember him by."

"Why, what happened?" he asked.

She shook her head. "I don't think I should tell you," she said. "I think he's ahead of you, Gallifrey Time. Was ahead of you, I mean."

He reached out and stroked one of the coral pillars in a gesture so reminiscent of the Doctor Rose almost broke down sobbing. "They treating you right, girl?" he asked softly. The ship hummed gently in response.

"Well," he said, stepping away, "she's perfectly happy to stay here, for some reason. She really likes you, as well. Now, what was it you wanted me to fix?"

She gaped at him. "That's it?"

He grinned back. "Yep, that's it. Seriously. I mean, I'll probably be a renegade too, when I grow up. I'm well on my way to being disowned as it is."'

That was probably when the idea came into her head, but it was so insane she kept quiet.

"So, what did you want me to fix? She seems to to be fully functional. If a bit temperamental and sporadic. And I mean that in a good way," he reassured the walls.

Rose sighed. "I don't know how to fly this thing. If you could just, like, program it to go back to its last destination..." Hope rose in her, almost choking her. She could rescue her Doctor.

"Well, that's easy enough- even for someone who failed in Temporal Mechanics," Theta told her. He twisted dials and pushed the wheel. "Hmm, maybe not," he said, frowning.

"Why? What's wrong?" Rose asked.

"The owner of this ship has locked her into stasis mode. Coming here was a one-way trip." He examined the view screen. "You've got a recorded message here, did you know?" He reached out to switch it on.

"No no no no no, don't look at that," Rose said very fast, pushing him away from the console. _Especially not if you're who I think you might possibly be, _she added mentally.

"Uh, okay," he said, disentangling himself from her. "But this will take some effort to override. I'm not sure if I can do it."

"Just try, okay?" she said. "Please?"

"All right," he said, leaning over the console, "I'll try."

* * *

_Earth, March 3, 2006, 9:33_

A few streets away, Ruath was having problems.

"What, you don't even accept a Universal Credit Card? This place really _is _the dumps, isn't it?"

Drax was still sitting in the TARDIS (their TARDIS, not the one currently occupied by our heroine and her unusual new friend) and getting angrier and angrier. He was also quite tired, hungry, and thirsty, and this was making him quite irritable. Which is why, in a few minutes, he is going to do something so colossally stupid it will even outshine Theta Sigma's Great Anti-Gravity Graduation Scheme. And that's saying something.

* * *

_Earth, March 3, 2006, 9:34_

There will now be a bit of time-placing, or placing the scene in relation to other events we are already aware of. Because of the aforementioned singular nature of time travel, this may be quite confusing. For example, at the moment, TARDIS time, Rose's Doctor is stripping wires at the Gamestation and having an argument with the Emperor Dalek (never a good move). Earth time, another Doctor was, a few blocks away, showing Sarah Jane the wonders of 2006, including iPods and plasma TVs. Gallifrey time, Time Lord Academy students Koschei, Magnus, and Ushas are frantically searching for two wayward members of the Deca before they get in rather serious trouble for hijacking a TARDIS; and out in the vastness of space in linear time the great flagship of the Sycorax Armada was steadily approaching our favorite planet.

While all this is going on, Rose Tyler is lounging on the 'Captain's Chair' and watching Theta Sigma try to override a lock protocol on a time ship that, for the moment, appears to be hers. She is studying his movements, his manner of speech, his profile, and deciding that maybe... just maybe...

"Ah!" he cried, jumping in triumph. "Got it!"

"You unlocked the TARDIS?" Rose cried.

"No," he said, smile fading, "just figured out which subroutine he's using to lock it. I _told _you this would take a while."

"That's okay," she said. And it was. She welcomed more time to watch the young alien, more time to think over her theory. Could it possibly be?... No, it couldn't. Surely not. But perhaps...

"Say, has your renegade got a telepathic link with his TARDIS?" Theta asked. His black hair had come out of its ponytail and was falling haphazardly around his face, emphasizing his pale skin and large eyes.

"Y-yes, I think so," Rose managed.

"So it's his original TARDIS, then, " Theta mused. "And he's a real Time Lord."

"What- of course he's a real Time Lord! He's got two hearts, for Pete's sake!"

Theta shook his head. "Rose, you're confused. Only a certain special percent of Gallifreyans become Time Lords. You have to study for a couple of centuries at the Academy and all. At the rate I'm going, I'll probably never be a full Time Lord with my own TARDIS." He sighed. "This makes it _so _much harder. Because of the telepathic bond the ship is naturally inclined to obey his instructions and very reluctant to let me override them." He frowned. "Although it's a lot easier than it has any right ot be. This ship must really like me."

"Oh, she does," Rose murmured.

* * *

_The Gamestation, March 3, 300,000, 9:35_

"Come on, Doc," Jack muttered as he readied for another round of shooting against the Daleks. "Don't let me down."

* * *

_Gallifrey, Official Time, 9:36_

"Those idiots," Ushas muttered.

Koschei shook his head. "I'm not surprised. It's exactly the kind of thing Thete would do. I just wonder why he didn't ask me to come along."

* * *

_Earth, March 3, 2006, 9:37_

"Rassilon's Key!" Theta yelped. "Drax, you idiot!"

"What is it?" Rose asked, startled.

"Come on, we have to go!" the young wannabe Time Lord replied, jumping up.

"Wait," Rose said, taking a deep breath. She had to know. "Theta, when we first talked, you were interrupted by Ruath. What were you going to say? What do you like people to call you?"

Puzzlement showed on his face. "Oh, well, in your language it'd probably translate to 'the Doctor'."

**Please R&R!**


	3. Off to Gallifrey

**Okay, so I lied about not doing young!Master and young!Rani. I just couldn't resist. Sorry this took so long to get up- I've been busy with other stuff, school starting and all that.  
**

_Gallifrey, Official Time, 9: 40_

The three Deca students walked quickly down the halls. They spoke in urgent whispers.

"Knowing Theta," Koschei said, "their plan will have been fiendishly clever, with one fatal design flaw that will land us all in trouble."

"Do you know what exactly they did?" Magnus asked worriedly.

"I have my suspicions," the other student said darkly. "He's been reading up on TARDIS piloting lately."

The other two gasped in horror. _"No!"_ Ushas whispered. "TARDIS misuse is one of the most strictly punished crimes on Gallifrey!"

"Exactly," Koshei muttered back, increasing his speed. He looked rather like his friend Theta, to the point where many mistook them for brothers, but you could never confuse the two. Koschei had cut his dark hair short so it swirled around his shoulders as he walked. His eyes, like Theta's, were quick and bright, but they also had a cruel, mischievous look to them. There was something almost bitter about them as well, and this was reinforced by the thin lips and angular cheekbones. His voice was dry and sarcastic. His whole manner seemed to be fighting against an unfair world.

The other two hurried to keep up. Ushas was even more aristocratic in appearance than Ruath, with long, intricately braided flaming red hair. She had a rather frighteningly intense look, as though everything she did was focused upon with all her attention. And a Time Lord has quite a lot of attention.

Magnus was not quite so glamorous as his fellows. Thin and gangly, with scruffy brown hair, he gave a sense of tagging along. You'd never know to look at him that he had one of the finest minds in the Academy.

"So then let's check the TARDIS bays," he suggested now.

Ushas looked about to tear her hair out. "We can't!" she quietly shrieked. "They're off bounds to all but full Time Lords, remember?"

"So how did they do it, then?" Koschei wondered. His brow knit in thought. Although never as academically brilliant as Theta, he had actually gotten better grades (since he turned up at the exams) and he was the possessor of an intricately analyzing mind. "Students are not allowed in the TARDIS bays, except... field trips! They could have snuck into a field trip and nicked a TARDIS."

"That's got to be it," Magnus agreed.

"So all that remains is _which_ TARDIS bay they picked- Oh! Uh, greetings, Professor Borusa."

The Professor squinted at them. He was an old, white-haired man, almost at the end of his first incarnation. Everybody knew he was over three hundred years old, and would regenerate soon. Koschei shivered at the thought. Like all young Gallifreyans, he found the concept of regeneration frightening. To have a new personality... to not be you anymore... sometimes he thought he'd just stay the way he was, but he knew that in the end, all Gallifreyans changed. So you could make different contributions to Time Lord knowledge, Professor Borusa said. At least it was far, far away, and he wouldn't have to worry for a couple of centuries.

"And what are three of my most promising students doing wandering about the halls during summer break?"

Koschei and Magnus flushed at this praise; Ushas remained cold and haughty.

"But where is my prize student, Theta?"

They all jumped and looked guilty. Koschei'd forgotten that the old man favored his friend. Professor Borusa taught mind-combat, something Theta'd turned out to be startlingly talented at... "We're just going to look for him now," Koschei said quickly.

"Ah? Very good, then," the Professor mumbled, half to himself. "Very good..." He wandered away.

"He's gone batty," Ushas declared. "Quite frankly I shall be glad when he regenerates."

"I shall miss him, though," Koshei said regretfully. After regeneration, the new young Borusa would take up a different walk of life. The only exceptions to this rule was the Presidency, which in a state of emergency could be held for two or more regenerations, if the President's new character had been found to be sound. Rassilon himself had ruled for seven regenerations, although he was now repudiated as a tyrant.

"Come on," Magnus urged his friends, "we must find them quickly."

* * *

_ Earth, March 3rd, 2006, 9:50_

Ruath had just gotten back from a rather complicated shopping trip (she'd eventually had to hypnotize the cashier to get him to accept her Galactic Credit Card) when she spotted Thete and that Earth girl running pell-mell towards the TARDIS. She rushed to catch up, her Gallifreyan physiology compensating for the heavy bags. "What's going on?" she asked crisply.

The girl shot her a look that said, 'hey, he's crazy, what can you do?' Thete glanced at Ruath. "There appears to be a slight complication," he said calmly as they sprinted along the sidewalk, dodging bemused pedestrians.

"And that would be what?" Ruath asked, dreading the answer. Thete seemed to get _calmer_ in the face of dangerous emergencies.

"Drax has taken off with our TARDIS," he said casually.

Ruath skidded to a halt. "WHAT?!" she shrieked.

This seemed to be news to the Earthling, too. "I take it this is not good?" she asked, almost as casual as Thete. Those two were insane.

_"Not good???"_ she shrieked. "I am _never_ going to forgive you for this, Theta Sigma! We are _through_!" She slapped him.

"Ooooh," Rose said. "Dissed!"

Ruath had no time for stupid Earth girls and their stupid slang. "Please Rassilon don't tell me we're _stuck_ here," she moaned.

Theta gave a bright and cheery smile. "Well, no, actually, we're not." Ruath wasn't sure whether to sigh in relief or cower in apprehension. Theta freaked her out sometimes.

Rose frowned. "What, exactly, are you planning, Mr. Sigma? I have a sneaking suspicion it involves _my_ time machine."

"Oh, yes, of course," he said absentmindedly. "Hope you don't mind."

Ruath and the Earth girl exchanged a look that said it all.

* * *

_ Earth, March 3rd, 10:00_

"Hey, Ruath, can you pass me that triple bypass polarity extrapolator?" Theta asked. The young Time Lady passed what looked to Rose like a metal spider. Theta, or the Doctor as she was half-beginning to think of him, screwed it firmly into place on the console, each wire leg clipped onto a different part of the dashboard. "Thanks. Rose, pass me the macrokinetic temporal connector, would you?"

She blinked. "Speak English, will you?"

"Sorry. I mean the big fat red wire, there." He pointed. Rose obediently reached out and passed it to him. He fitted it in, as intent upon his work as her Doctor working on his ship. She shook her head to clear it. It was so hard to believe that this gangly teenager was her Doctor. But if this worked, she'd never see Theta again. She didn't know what to feel. Yet there was a small but persistent feeling of triumph in her. She finally knew the Doctor's real name. _Oh, I am so going to tease him about that, _she thought. Then she remembered, and again felt that sick feeling in the bottom of her stomach. Unless this worked, she might never see the Doctor again.

_"I just remembered, Rose! I can dance!"_

Okay. No more of that.

"Ah-hah! Just attach the neutron extrapolator, and there we go!" He clapped his hands, then rubbed them together. Rose wondered if that was a Time Lord gesture, or whether he'd picked it up in his researches of humanity. There was a hum as the central column lit up. Theta slammed down the bicycle pump and the familiar grating noise filled the air.

"Where exactly are we going again?" Rose asked. "I need to go rescue my traveling companion, in case you've forgotten."

He looked wounded. "Of course I haven't forgotten, Rose, we're just going to stop by Gallifrey and drop off Ruath before we go."

The alien girl stood up straighter. "Oh, no way! No way you are leaving me behind while you go gallivanting off on your bloody stupid adventures, Theta Sigma. I am coming."

Theta sighed. Rose guessed they'd had this argument before, under different circumstances. "It's not an adventure, Ruath. I'm just stopping by, picking up Rose' friend, and coming straight back."

"Actually, no, you aren't," Rose interrupted.

Ruath shot her a look of pure poison. "And why would that be?"

Rose grimaced. _"Daleks_." She put as much venom into the word as she could muster. She couldn't believe she'd once taken pity on one of those metal monsters.

The Time Lords' faces were identical pictures of befuddlement. Rose's heart twisted. _They've never heard of Daleks..._

"What are Daleks?" Theta asked.

She swallowed. "Tell you later. Let's just get going." She gave him a desperate look. Ruath frowned.

"Well, we're here!" Theta announced a few moments later, breaking an uncomfortable silence. He flung open the TARDIS doors. "Gallifrey!"

Rose gasped. Somehow, she hadn't expected _this_. She was at the Doctor's planet. Part of her was scared to look, but the other part said that if she didn't, she'd regret it all her life. Slowly, with trepidation, she walked to the door and stepped outside.

There wasn't much of a view, and her stomach sank in disappointment. They were in some sort of hangar bay, but what kind of ship it was designed to hold she had no idea. There were objects of all shapes and sizes here. _TARDISes with fully functional chamelion circuits, I guess._

Theta cautiously slipped around the side of the TARDIS, keeping out of sight. Rose followed him, tiptoeing. Ruath came after her, looking like she was actively trying not to complain. Theta turned to Rose. "We're in the TARDIS hanger bay," he whispered.

"Yeah, I kind of gathered that," Rose replied sarcastically.

"Well, come on the-" He stopped talking with a sudden stop, as someone had just ran into him. As he picked himself up, Rose examined the three young people who had just joined the company. Also on the ground was a dark, hawkish-looking young man. Standing behind him, looking extremely startled, was a young, startlingly beautiful and arrogant woman with flaming red hair and a nerdy, geekish fellow next to her.

"Koschei!" Theta exclaimed in delight, brushing off his extravagant clothing.

The other boy punched him. Or what _looked_ like punching. His fist actually stopped a few inches in front of Theta's chest. Yet the young Doctor toppled backward, landing on his backside again. "Ow!" he exclaimed. "Telekinesis punch?! What was _that_ for?"

Rose looked at the faces of the three strangers. They did not look much pleased. "We're in trouble, aren't we?" she said happily. _This_ was more like it.

**Please R&R!**


	4. New People

**Sorry this took so long to update. The fanfic muse deserted me, then came back in a rush, forcing me to write this chapter. In other news, I have had an allergic reaction to Doomsday and am now anti- Rose/Ten. gasp The horror. I think it was the way he was so upbeat about sending her off to Pete's world. And I mean come on, her character was getting old, all the character exploration was done in the 1st season. I am still adamantly Nine/Rose, though.**

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"So then Koschei came up with the idea that you might have sneaked into one of the field trips, so we checked all the field trips to TARDIS bays of the Prydonian Chapter that were going on, but we couldn't find any missing TARDISes, so we realized that you must have sneaked into one of the other chapter's field trips, so we checked about five before we found you," the brown-haired, nerdy fellow finished. The one apparently named Koshei stood glowering silently. Theta was trying to look remorseful, and failing utterly. Ruath and the beautiful lady were exchanging knowing looks, while Rose was jumping in excitement. This was just like traveling with the Doctor again!

Suddenly there was a creaking noise, and the far-off doors opened. Everyone jumped, then ran, mad with terror. Koshei led the way, darting between extremely peculiar objects to a distant side door, the other Time-Lords-In-Training and Rose scampering after him. Rose' sneakers thudded against the metal floor. Distractedly she noticed that the three new arrivals were wearing robes of red and gold. Then Koschei was at the door, pulling at it desperately. "I can't believe they're still using manual locks!" he hissed. "How archaic can you get?!"

"I prefer to think of it as 'retro'," Theta said. "Mind your eyes," he added, pulling out an object that looked suspiciously like the sonic screwdriver. As she closed her eyes against the blue glare, Rose relived the memory of that first moment in the basement of Hendricks. The door popped open, and they ran blinking out into the Gallifreyan afternoon.

Rose's first thought was, 'Wow.' That was also her second thought, and her third. They were high up on a hill, the burnished dome of the TARDIS hangar looming behind them. The hill was covered with long soft red grass, and below them lay a sea of silver, the leaves of many graceful trees. At the edges of the horizon were impossibly tall mountains. The light was tinted a soft scarlet as well, the sky a dark red. Two suns hung above, one at its height, the other nearly setting. She turned around, and behind the hangar dome rose the Capitol in all its splendor.

"Oh my god," she managed.

Koschei scowled. "Come on," he growled. "We've got to get back to the Citadel before anyone notices us missing."

They ran across the hill. Rose noticed an extra spring in her step, and looked back at the mountains thoughtfully. _Lower gravity._

Then they came in full sight of the city.

Rose's eyes widened, and she gasped in wonder, eyes seeking out every detail. Then something made her turn and look at Theta. He was looking at her with obvious disapproval, but as she met his eyes he lowered them, mumbling something under his breath. She made a mental note to ask him about it later. _If there was a later._

They strolled leisurely down the hill, Koschei still silent and glaring. Ushas, however, was not so quiet. "Excuse me if I'm being rude, but who in Rassilon's name is she?" She indicated Rose.

"Oh, she's a student from another chapter," Theta explained airily.

"Yeah, right," Koschei said, breaking his apparent vow of silence. "Wearing Earth clothing and unconnected to the Matrix? She's a native, isn't she?"

"She's got a name, you know," Rose broke in.

"But a Rose by any other name would smell as sweet," Theta said.

"Shut up, that joke is SO not funny anymore," said the long-suffering Rose.

"Thetarionsigmatredavendar, you are in SO much trouble," Ushas said wonderingly.

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Time is a very strange thing. Back in the good old days, all time travelers had to worry about was accidentally becoming their own fathers. Then people discovered 'all that bloody quantum' and you could hardly step outside your TARDIS door without causing a paradox, except that was okay because it wasn't long before they discovered parallel universes. This lulled everyone into a sense of false security, and then Schrödinger stuck his kitty in a box and now we all have to deal with 'the uncertainty principle.' 

Generally, the Doctor tried not to let this worry him.

He had learned from a very early age, about 200 or so, that it never paid to get too caught up in all that stuff. He'd had a bit of an epiphany after realizing that he was quite possibly the reincarnated 'Other' of ancient mythology and that the earnest young woman standing in front of him claiming to be his granddaughter might actually not be that insane, and it was this: Time, on the whole, was better left well alone. Time _travel, _of course, was a whole different story; you had to time travel just to get off the blasted planet of Gallifrey, for Rassilon's sake. But actually changing the course of history? Count him out. This belief was firmly reinforced with the whole Davros incident (all three of them) and of course the Faction Paradox (he was still not sure _just _what had happened) and he tried, by and large, to stick to this rule. There were a few exceptions, of course (1987 and being devoured by Time-Lord eating monsters being just one of several such happenings) but these were few and far between. Sure, his fellow Time Lords would claim otherwise, but they were all pompous, stuffy idiots anyway, so who cared?

But one good thing about the essential nature of Time was that even now when all hope appeared to be finally lost, and not just 'rolled under the couch lost', but actual, gone, never-gonna-come-back lost, there was still, at the end of it all, when you really got down to it, a little teensy bit of Hope. Because really, however much he might fool himself about being ready to die, there was really so much left to do. Barcelona, for one thing… he'd always wanted to take Rose there…

This Hope, this stubborn and elusive thing that refused to jump ship even when all the rats and crew members had swum madly for the distant shore, was, though just a flicker, firmly based in logical thought, which went like this: Two words, Bad and Wolf, had been scattered throughout Time and Space, apparently for the sole benefit of Rose and himself. His very soul rebelled at the thought that this might, perhaps, be no more than a bizarre coincidence, and therefore they must have had a purpose. And this purpose, whatever it was, was obviously no use if he was dead. It was a very tenuous Hope, but it was also supported by a number of other unexplained facts he had encountered in the past, such as the Merlin Doctor, the name Doctor John Smith on the passenger list of the _Titanic, _and several of the more indecipherable sticky-notes plastered around the monitor screen of the TARDIS console, which he strongly suspected had filtered through a hole in time. Sadly, however, the aforementioned nature of Time meant that this might all mean nothing and he very well could die on an abandoned spaceship defending a pathetic loser of a planet from a bunch of evil pepper pots with dreams of galactic domination.

But he found it hard to believe that the Destiny which had preserved him for so long, even through the aftershocks of the Time War, would abandon him now. He was a bit more worried about Jack, who had no such protective prophecy…

And so he exchanged pleasantries with the pepper pot Emperor, and hoped that Rose, at least, was getting a bit of peace and quiet.

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"What on earth possessed you to bring a native creature back to the inner workings of the most advanced city in the universe?" Ushas shrieked. 

"She is not a _creature!" _Theta bellowed back, his expression one of horror, shared by Ruath. Even Koschei was frowning. Magnus was just being his usual suck-up self.

"I am not a _creature!" _Rose echoed.

"See? She's not a creature, so there!"

"You, Thetarionsigmatredavendar, are IMPOSSIBLE!"

"What did I tell you about NEVER using that name!"

"You're only even in the Academy 'cause your father pulled strings! Everyone thinks you're a freak!"

"Well, I think you're all pompous scumbags!"

"You ran away from the Vortex! Only freaks do that!"

"Ushas you-" He said a word in a musical language that the TARDIS refused to translate. The other Gallifreyans looked shocked.

_"Theta!"_Ruath exclaimed.

"Well she deserved it!"

Rose walked off down the hill. Sweet as it was that Theta was defending her, she was sick of arguments.

She looked out at the city, glimmering in the light of two suns, and for a moment she thought she heard singing in her ears.

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**Have you heard? They're making a Children in Need Special with David Tennant and (I thought I was going to have a heart attack) Peter Davison as Fifth Doctor!!! Total fangirl joy!!! I think I may faint!!!**

** Anywho, review. **


	5. Old Stories

**Surely I'm not the only one who saw this in 'The Mark of the Rani'.**

"Okay," Theta said, once everyone had calmed down, "what we need to do is get back to Rose's time machine. I need to bring Rose to her friend." They were standing in a group, leaning against the burnished copper dome of the hangar.

"Why did you even bring her to Gallifrey anyway?" Ushas asked.

"Ushas-" he began.

She looked down. "All right. I'm sorry."

"I'm sorry too. I shouldn't have gotten so angry at you. After all, you've been brainwashed by the pompous idiots running this place."

She slapped him, hard. "Theta, you condescending idiot-"

And then he kissed her.

And Rose sat down suddenly, the planet spinning around her. _Is this the feeling the Doctor was always going on about?_ she thought disjointedly. Ushas was kissing him back. She was so beautiful and intelligent. At that moment, Rose felt like strangling her.

"Oh, yuk," Ruath commented disgustedly.

For some reason, Rose's eyes rested on Koshei. He was looking rather like she felt, his dark eyes seething with jealousy and something else she couldn't identify. His left hand was restlessly drumming out a beat on the curving metal wall.

Theta broke away. "Come on," he said sharply, and ran to the hangar door, the others trailing behind in shock. He opened it quickly with his sonic screwdriver, and they quietly crept into the hangar. Rose looked at Ushas. She had a strange expression of delight and discontent together. Rose glanced away quickly, and looked at Theta again. He was the Doctor, she knew that; and yet he was so different. Most of the time he seemed to act like an eccentric college student, nothing like the amazing and sometimes frightening man she knew.

She wondered how his relationship with Ushas had gone. Eight hundred and fifteen years was certainly long enough to date, get married, have kids, even grandkids. She muffled a laugh as she imagined the Doctor as a grandfather. That was just plain preposterous.

They snuck around tall Greek pillars, small pyramids, Italian restaurants and even, Rose could ave sworn, a car. The police box was sitting amid a cluster of... Rose felt her eyes grow wide... inflatable giraffes?

_This is _so_surreal, _she thought.

They reached the TARDIS, and Rose felt a strange humming coming from the ship. She could hear faint, far-off alien singing, and frowned, trying to locate the sound. So intent was she upon it that she tripped over the TARDIS doorstep and fell with an "oomph".

Theta leaned over her, concerned. He reached out his hand to help her up. She grabbed at it without thinking, hearing _his _voice saying, _"Don't. Touch. The baby!" _right before their fingers made contact. The singing soared in her ears, drowning out everything else, and she sank to her knees, dizzy.

_That's the first time we touched,_she thought. But then that thought vanished as her senses widened and spread. The universe was vast and beautiful and golden, and all hers. She was soaring over sun-baked planets, surfing the waves of a supernova... _"Rose. Rose, can you hear me? Rose. Come back." _She pushed the tiny, insignificant voice away, and dived to the bottom of an ocean crevasse. _"Rose. Listen to me." _And suddenly she could see _him. _Not just his face, sharp and concerned, but the rest of him.. his timelines stretching out and around and all over the place, tangled like yarn... _"Rose." _And suddenly it resolved itself into a pattern, a spiderweb of breathtaking beauty... _"Rose." _Reluctantly, she let herself be pulled back into her metal shell, leaving the human girl.

Rose blinked. "Did I black out or something?" Theta's face swam into focus. He was bent over her, his long fingers lightly touching her forehead. He sat back, looking worried. Rose sat up. "What just happened?"

Theta shook his head. "Don't worry about it." He stood up, and she became aware that they were around the console. Ruath was touching the controls, a confused look on her face. She glanced up.

"Theta, this ship... it's a TARDIS."

Theta sighed, taking a deep breath. "Well, yes, Ruath, so it is. Now please forget all about it and help me reverse the coordinate matrix."

She opened her mouth like she wanted to protest some more, but he shushed her and went to the screen. Rose got to her feet shakily. She still wasn't quite sure what had happened, but she was willing to concentrate on other things at the moment. Like... "Where did everybody go?"

"They bailed," Ruath said disgustedly.

"But... you didn't?"

"He's not getting rid of me that easily," Ruath said, elbowing Theta. They grinned at each other, best of friends.

"Although," Theta said, frowning, "you _are _going to leave as soon as we get this working."

"Oh, all right," she said. "As long as you tell me everything that happens when you get back."

"Agreed." He grinned. _He grins even more than my Doctor, and looks just as daft when he does it, _Rose thought. Then Ruath left, waving, and Theta pulled up a lever. The sound of dematerialization filled the console room as the familiar shaking began. Then it stopped. "We're in the Vortex," Theta remarked. "I haven't looked after this thing well, has it? Gives a bit of a rough ride."

Rose blinked again. "What?"

"Oh, come on. It was obvious, the look on your face when I told you my nickname. I go by that now, do I? Which seems to follow that I actually _got _my doctorate, which is a relief, I can tell you."

She backed away. "I never said-"

"Look, you've been _screaming _it, anyone with the most low-level telepathic field would have picked it up, and I happen to be rather sensitive in that area."

She swallowed. "You- you've been reading my- my _mind?" Oh, God, maybe he's been reading my mind that whole year! _She felt herself flush red with embarrassment and disbelief.

Theta shrugged. Then his eyes brightened. "Tell me, what am I like, this future me?"

Fighting down the urge to cry, she spit, "For one thing, he's worth ten of you!"

Confusement in those beautiful blue eyes. "Why, are you offended?"

Memory came back, unwillingly. _"Your machine gets inside my mind- it gets inside and it changes things, and you didn't even think to ask?"_

"_Well, I didn't think about it like that."_

"If you're offended- I mean, I won't do it again, then. I mean, I'm actually a lot nicer than most of my friends. They all think I'm really weird," he said with a self-deprecating laugh.

_What, even Ushas? _Rose thought acidly.

"I mean, I believed in the Toclaphane, Grandfather Paradox and Bad Wolf until I was fifty-"

"What?" she interrupted him. The singing was coming back, but even it was drowned out by the disbelief in her mind.

"I said-"

"You said _Bad Wolf. _What the _hell _is Bad Wolf? _Tell me!" _she screamed.

He took a step backward. "Well, the legend goes that a TARDIS takes on human form in order to save her Time Lord- it's just a myth, TARDISes aren't sentient, but it's still a pretty romantic story. All Gallifreyan children know it- it's just a myth-"

_Singing, and power that went on forever._

Theta watched in horror as Rose walked to the console, her eyes seeing something else._"Open," _she said in a voice of command. _"Open, and we will save him." _The TARDIS opened, and light burst forth. Theta looked away quickly.

"Rose!" he yelled. "Stop! You can't!"

She turned to him, and her eyes burned golden. _"I am the Bad Wolf," _she said._"I can do anything."_

And the TARDIS started to materialize.

**Give thanks to the great 'The-Chibi's-Are-Chasing-Me' or whatever her name is for making me write another chapter. Finally, we're getting down to business.**


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